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North
Elvis Costello
Terry Lawson
 
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Despite being issued on the storied classical imprint, Costello's latest solo album is, in fact, a cabaret-style song cycle, and despite his protestations, one as blatantly autobiographical as Blue or Blood on the Tracks, if far less intense. The two opening songs — "You Left Me in the Dark" and "Someone Took the Words Away" — mourn the loss of a marriage, as the album musically and movingly documents the singer's discovery that he can still be as besotted as a teenager.
The best of a fine lot is the funny, loving "Let Me Tell You About Her," in which he attempts to temper his desire to shout his new love's attributes from the rooftops with his responsibility to behave as the sort of gentleman who doesn't kiss and tell. (The sentiment is wonderfully underlined by the interplay between veteran saxophonist Lee Konitz and trumpeter Lew Soloff.) The accompaniment ranges from small combo to 28-piece orchestra to solo piano, with nary a guitar taken from its case. One wonders whether these ballads might not have been better served by the Burt Bacharach arrangements of Painted From Memory, but that's a small quibble; to go North is to go with that wonderful feeling.
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